Category: Leadership in Drama

So many Drama Teachers are also English Teachers and the cross over in terms of subject knowledge is obvious. The teaching of English can gain so much from having a Drama teacher on board. There is a obvious cross over in terms of approaching understanding, deconstructing and exploring plays – but those same questions can be asked of literature as well. I’ve had so many … Continue reading Don’t Ignore Your Inner English Teacher

There are always things that one needs to focus on as any a practitioner and a professional. As teachers we are expected to juggle so many balls at the same time that it is inevitable that some of those balls will get dropped and we need to pick them up again later when things are less busy. In any one day we have to decide … Continue reading 3 things I wish I knew more about…

Here is a list of my top five books for my practice as a Drama Teacher. They are in no particular order because each one is for a different purpose so it would be silly to rank them in any way. However, they really are all my go-to books for inspiration for activities, approaches and ideas for teaching drama. Royal Shakespeare Company Teacher Toolkit This … Continue reading Five awesome books for Drama Teachers

Involving parents in a child’s education is special and important, but it is mainly kept to the confines of parents evenings and bad things. However, we all have some experience of a parent we’ve got to know better, maybe the parent of the child who did GCSE, now doing A Level and has been in every school productions possible. That’s a lovely relationship and you … Continue reading When to phone home.

As I have started teaching Key Stage 3 Drama for the first time in several years in my school I am reunited with, what we call in my school, Achievement Assistants (Learning Assistants or Teaching Assistants in old language). Having previously been only a Key Stage 4 and 5 teacher I haven’t had the presence of anyone else in my room for a while. I wanted to do … Continue reading Teaching Assistants in Drama

I am always on the look out for ways of communicating to parents and others the value of studying drama has on a young person. Recently I’ve had the opportunity to re-instate Drama at Key Stage 3 in my school, a major step forward in the current climate. As part of that I’ve been building a display in my Drama Studio which focuses on the … Continue reading Building on Drama’s “Soft Skills”